The last few weeks have seen exciting developments. As a reminder, Governor Steve Beshear established a “Transforming Education in Kentucky” task force in the fall of 2009. For more information on the task force and the final report, go to http://tek.ky.gov. While there were a number of recommendations, over the past few weeks we have seen follow-up activity on two recommendations.
1. As recommended by the Governor’s Task Force on Early Childhood Development and Education, Kentucky’s education policy leaders should reorganize the Early Childhood Development Authority, renaming it the Early Childhood Advisory Council; create a system of support for students at all levels of kindergarten-readiness, including parent education and learning; and create common developmentally appropriate school readiness standards and instruments.
Recently, Governor Beshear held a press conference to announce the selection of Terry Tolan (former president and CEO of the United Way of Kentucky) to lead the Early Childhood Advisory Council. The first action for the council is to submit an Early Learning Challenge Grant application as part of the Race to the Top federal initiative. The grant application will build on the excellent work that has already been done by the early childhood task force.
Key implications for school districts are the establishment of school readiness standards, a common instrument for measuring school readiness, uniform standards (rating system) for all child care providers and a K-3 Program Review to ensure that schools are ready for children. The grant application is due in mid-October, with announcement of funding coming in late November or early December. Thirty-five states and the District of Columbia have filed intentions to apply for the $500 million available. Kentucky is eligible for up to $60 million. It is anticipated that 5-10 states will receive awards.
A second recommendation dealt with career and technical education in Kentucky schools.
2. The Governor should establish a steering committee to include the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB) and other external partners representing local district CTE staff, Office of Career and Technical Education (OCTE) field staff, CPE, Educational Professional Standards Board (EPSB), KDE and workforce leaders to develop a comprehensive statewide plan for implementing secondary Career & Technical Education with an emphasis on innovation, integration of core academics, 21st-century skills, project-based learning and the establishment of full-time CTE programs. The steering committee’s plan should include a new delivery system that integrates and elevates the two offices in KDE and OCTE currently delivering CTE. The plan should be submitted to the legislature’s Interim Joint Committee on Education no later than October 1, 2011, for implementing legislation to be adopted by the 2012 General Assembly.
Education and Workforce Development Cabinet Secretary Joe Meyer and I have named the steering committee members, and the first meeting was held. For more information on the activities of the committee, see notes from the meeting at http://tek.ky.gov. Several work groups are meeting in order to delve deeper into details. These groups are studying professional development, Carl Perkins funding, sector strategy, curriculum and operations. School districts should stay informed of the recommendations that will come from these work groups to the steering committee.
With both of these activities, the collaboration has been exceptional. It is very apparent that Kentucky is working “together” to improve the future for our children.
Showing posts with label early. Show all posts
Showing posts with label early. Show all posts
Friday, July 22, 2011
Friday, February 18, 2011
Kentucky’s Moral, Economic and Civic Obligation
I recently read a very disturbing report. Incarceration and Social Inequity by Bruce Western and Becky Pettit was published in the summer 2010 Daedalus. Here are some interesting facts from the report.
· Incarceration rates are currently at eight times the historic average.
· Men make up 90 percent of those incarcerated.
· African-American males are seven times more likely than white males to be incarcerated.
· More than 70 percent of the prison population are high school dropouts.
Put in real numbers, for every 100 African-American males who enter high school, only about 50 will graduate, and about 25 will be incarcerated at some point. African-American males born into poverty have a 1 in 4 chance of being incarcerated and a 1 in 17 chance of getting a college degree. More than 10 million people are incarcerated every year locally, and over 700,000 are incarcerated at the state or federal level.
The impact on African-American families is that 1 in 10 have a parent in jail. We have the highest incarceration rate among industrialized countries, and Kentucky has one of the highest incarceration rates in the nation. In the United States, incarceration costs us more than $70 billion each year.
We have a moral obligation, an economic obligation and a civic obligation to do something about this. What can we do?
· We need more early childhood programs.
· We must improve alternative education options.
· We must improve our ability for early identification of at-risk children.
· Our poor communities should have access to more jobs programs.
· The dropout age must be raised.
We can invest now at about $10,000 per child, or we can pay much more later. The Transforming Education in Kentucky Task Force report that will be released next week will provide recommendations addressing many of the suggestions from the report mentioned in this blog.
Let's take resources from programs not working and focus on strategies that will work. Now is the time for bold leaders. Let's get to work making a difference.
· Incarceration rates are currently at eight times the historic average.
· Men make up 90 percent of those incarcerated.
· African-American males are seven times more likely than white males to be incarcerated.
· More than 70 percent of the prison population are high school dropouts.
Put in real numbers, for every 100 African-American males who enter high school, only about 50 will graduate, and about 25 will be incarcerated at some point. African-American males born into poverty have a 1 in 4 chance of being incarcerated and a 1 in 17 chance of getting a college degree. More than 10 million people are incarcerated every year locally, and over 700,000 are incarcerated at the state or federal level.
The impact on African-American families is that 1 in 10 have a parent in jail. We have the highest incarceration rate among industrialized countries, and Kentucky has one of the highest incarceration rates in the nation. In the United States, incarceration costs us more than $70 billion each year.
We have a moral obligation, an economic obligation and a civic obligation to do something about this. What can we do?
· We need more early childhood programs.
· We must improve alternative education options.
· We must improve our ability for early identification of at-risk children.
· Our poor communities should have access to more jobs programs.
· The dropout age must be raised.
We can invest now at about $10,000 per child, or we can pay much more later. The Transforming Education in Kentucky Task Force report that will be released next week will provide recommendations addressing many of the suggestions from the report mentioned in this blog.
Let's take resources from programs not working and focus on strategies that will work. Now is the time for bold leaders. Let's get to work making a difference.
Friday, July 30, 2010
Early Childhood Benefits/Teacher Evaluations
In these days of Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr and other services that provide daily, hourly and even minute-by-minute updates, I get lots of information about reports, studies and education events. This week , on my Twitter and Facebook accounts, I highlighted two of the more interesting reports.
* a terrific new report on long-term benefits of early childhood education: http://obs.rc.fas.harvard.edu/chetty/STAR_slides.pdf
* an interesting report from the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences (IES), which reinforces Kentucky’s caution on using value-added criteria for high-stakes decisions: http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/pubs/20104004/
Readers of these reports may find conflicting information. The early childhood report was mentioned in a New York Times article entitled “The Case for $320,000 Kindergarten Teachers.” The report came from Harvard economist Raj Chetty. Many critics of government spending on early childhood education allege that the early gains for children often wash out over the course of the school years. I really liked a quote attributed to Mr. Chetty – “We don’t really care about test scores. We care about adult outcomes.”
Mr. Chetty and his team reviewed the adult outcomes for students who were part of the Tennessee Star Project from the ‘80s. They found students who were in the most effective kindergarten classrooms were more likely as adults to go to college, less likely to be single parents, more likely to be saving for retirement and more likely to earn more than their peers in the same study who were in less effective classrooms. So, the article and study seem to support the big idea of teacher effectiveness having a major role in student learning and adult outcomes.
In a somewhat conflicting report from the National Center for Education and Evaluation, researchers raised many cautions about using teacher effectiveness data for high-stakes decisions like merit pay and tenure. The report, Error Rates in Measuring Teacher and School Performance Based on Test Score Gains, highlighted concerns about error rates when using this data. The report states that three years of teacher data that classifies teachers as low performing could be erroneous as much as one out of four times. The report shows that data classifying a teacher as high-performing also could be erroneous as much as one out of four times. With five years of data, the results become a little more stable, and if the data are used mainly for school classification, then the error rates decline. Regardless, this research does raise much concern about the use of one, two or even three years of data to make high-stakes decisions.
So, the question becomes, “how do we resolve the apparent conflict in these two reports with regard to outcomes and the impact of teachers on the learning outcomes?” The answer is in multiple measures. I have been clear with policy makers, superintendents, teachers and other stakeholders. Kentucky will not depend solely on test scores for high-stakes decisions for teachers and principals. Both of these studies point out concerns with just using test scores. In Kentucky, we will continue to work with teachers, principals and other stakeholders to develop evaluation systems that utilize multiple measures of effectiveness.
* a terrific new report on long-term benefits of early childhood education: http://obs.rc.fas.harvard.edu/chetty/STAR_slides.pdf
* an interesting report from the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences (IES), which reinforces Kentucky’s caution on using value-added criteria for high-stakes decisions: http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/pubs/20104004/
Readers of these reports may find conflicting information. The early childhood report was mentioned in a New York Times article entitled “The Case for $320,000 Kindergarten Teachers.” The report came from Harvard economist Raj Chetty. Many critics of government spending on early childhood education allege that the early gains for children often wash out over the course of the school years. I really liked a quote attributed to Mr. Chetty – “We don’t really care about test scores. We care about adult outcomes.”
Mr. Chetty and his team reviewed the adult outcomes for students who were part of the Tennessee Star Project from the ‘80s. They found students who were in the most effective kindergarten classrooms were more likely as adults to go to college, less likely to be single parents, more likely to be saving for retirement and more likely to earn more than their peers in the same study who were in less effective classrooms. So, the article and study seem to support the big idea of teacher effectiveness having a major role in student learning and adult outcomes.
In a somewhat conflicting report from the National Center for Education and Evaluation, researchers raised many cautions about using teacher effectiveness data for high-stakes decisions like merit pay and tenure. The report, Error Rates in Measuring Teacher and School Performance Based on Test Score Gains, highlighted concerns about error rates when using this data. The report states that three years of teacher data that classifies teachers as low performing could be erroneous as much as one out of four times. The report shows that data classifying a teacher as high-performing also could be erroneous as much as one out of four times. With five years of data, the results become a little more stable, and if the data are used mainly for school classification, then the error rates decline. Regardless, this research does raise much concern about the use of one, two or even three years of data to make high-stakes decisions.
So, the question becomes, “how do we resolve the apparent conflict in these two reports with regard to outcomes and the impact of teachers on the learning outcomes?” The answer is in multiple measures. I have been clear with policy makers, superintendents, teachers and other stakeholders. Kentucky will not depend solely on test scores for high-stakes decisions for teachers and principals. Both of these studies point out concerns with just using test scores. In Kentucky, we will continue to work with teachers, principals and other stakeholders to develop evaluation systems that utilize multiple measures of effectiveness.
Friday, February 5, 2010
Transforming Education in Kentucky Task Force
This week, the Governor’s Transforming Education in Kentucky (TEK) Task Force met for the first time. My thanks to Lu Young, superintendent of the Jessamine County school district, and the staff at East Jessamine High School for hosting the first event.
It was a great event, with a panel discussion on KERA and a very exciting presentation from former Kentuckian Ginny Edwards, who is the editor/publisher of Education Week. Governor Beshear gave us our charge, and one of the key issues that we will review is the early childhood-to-school transition. This issue really ignites a passion that I have for addressing the needs of children.
As a superintendent in North Carolina, I saw firsthand the impact of early childhood programs on student readiness for school. I also know that it is essential to address student vocabulary development in the early years of childhood, or the students will come to school already several years behind. I asked our early childhood office to let me know some of the things we are doing and some of the things we need to be doing. Thanks to the team for the following information.
Things we are doing in Kentucky:
· development of regional teams of health, education, elected officials, civic and community leaders to address issues and barriers that prevent access to high-quality programs and schools for children birth-8 and their families through the Kentucky Great by 8 economic growth initiative
· collaborative partnerships across state agencies through the KIDS NOW initiative that help promote quality and a focus on whole-child development.
· recognition of high-quality district preschool programs through the Preschool Classrooms of Excellence and Early Childhood Centers of Quality/Excellence initiatives
· recent release of the Field Guide to the Kentucky Early Childhood Standards to give all professionals working with young children ideas of how to incorporate the early learning standards in their program planning
What we would like to see:
· promotion of a definition of school readiness that focuses on the whole child – ready child, ready schools, ready families and communities
· development of a common, reliable, appropriate assessment that will be implemented by the kindergarten teacher after the first 30 days of a child’s attendance, specifically for instructional purposes for student mastery of the standards
· stronger partnerships between private child care, Head Start and state-funded preschool to promote collaboration and quality and to provide opportunities for more children to attend preschool
My experience is that if schools are not ready for the children, the impact of early childhood programs will be lost by 3rd grade. The investment in early childhood is immense and has the potential of impacting our economy and social program costs over the long run. However, schools also must do their part in connecting with the preschool and early childhood community. It is terrific to find this connection already happening in a number of school districts in Kentucky. The Governor’s TEK Task Force’s focus on this issue also will highlight the need and possible solutions.
It was a great event, with a panel discussion on KERA and a very exciting presentation from former Kentuckian Ginny Edwards, who is the editor/publisher of Education Week. Governor Beshear gave us our charge, and one of the key issues that we will review is the early childhood-to-school transition. This issue really ignites a passion that I have for addressing the needs of children.
As a superintendent in North Carolina, I saw firsthand the impact of early childhood programs on student readiness for school. I also know that it is essential to address student vocabulary development in the early years of childhood, or the students will come to school already several years behind. I asked our early childhood office to let me know some of the things we are doing and some of the things we need to be doing. Thanks to the team for the following information.
Things we are doing in Kentucky:
· development of regional teams of health, education, elected officials, civic and community leaders to address issues and barriers that prevent access to high-quality programs and schools for children birth-8 and their families through the Kentucky Great by 8 economic growth initiative
· collaborative partnerships across state agencies through the KIDS NOW initiative that help promote quality and a focus on whole-child development.
· recognition of high-quality district preschool programs through the Preschool Classrooms of Excellence and Early Childhood Centers of Quality/Excellence initiatives
· recent release of the Field Guide to the Kentucky Early Childhood Standards to give all professionals working with young children ideas of how to incorporate the early learning standards in their program planning
What we would like to see:
· promotion of a definition of school readiness that focuses on the whole child – ready child, ready schools, ready families and communities
· development of a common, reliable, appropriate assessment that will be implemented by the kindergarten teacher after the first 30 days of a child’s attendance, specifically for instructional purposes for student mastery of the standards
· stronger partnerships between private child care, Head Start and state-funded preschool to promote collaboration and quality and to provide opportunities for more children to attend preschool
My experience is that if schools are not ready for the children, the impact of early childhood programs will be lost by 3rd grade. The investment in early childhood is immense and has the potential of impacting our economy and social program costs over the long run. However, schools also must do their part in connecting with the preschool and early childhood community. It is terrific to find this connection already happening in a number of school districts in Kentucky. The Governor’s TEK Task Force’s focus on this issue also will highlight the need and possible solutions.
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